Citroen XM Forum

My original 2.0i turbo recently developed quite a severe exhaust leak that I was fairly sure pointed to the manifold gasket and at 133k that seemed fair enough. The slightly later car I have was leaking at my acquisition at around 85K! Although my experience of working on the 2.0 engine is very limited I thought I would have a go and it turned out to be a bigger task that the PRV 24v!! Like the 24v there is some access from underneath but the engine still had to be jacked forward and there are also turbo breather pipes and a heat shield to remove and no access from the side as the manifold is higher up. One manifold nut had to be heated to shift but none broke fortunately and only one was difficult to access and needed a clever socket extension arrangement. The nuts incidently have strange serrated heads that I have not met before. In Haynes it states that you need to remove the turbo but luckily this was not required apart from the bracket off the engine that allowed the manifold assembly to drop away (see first photo). Anyway the old gasket was well and truly toasted and overdue for replacement and you could see the gas marks, plus the stuck on pieces were detached and disintergrated. I had picked up an original Citroen gasket on ebay some time ago and the second photo shows the old and the new. Regards, Matthew T.

Another well earned 'well done' Matthew. You have been busy!
Sounds like a job and a half.
Which car is this...I only know them by colours!!! Mandarin or Anthracite?

Thanks Russ and it is the Anthracite car that you saw at ICCCR, ie. the matching pair to yours! Regards, Matthew T.

Well done Matthew I've never done the job on an XM but I have on a TCT engined Xantia and it's a real corker of a job. I have a feeling the XM may be just a smidgen easier but not by very much at all... I take my hat off to you sir!

It's one of those jobs I've done once and would be happy not to do it again but having a TCT Xantia (My Activa) I bet I'll need to at some point...

Funny old gaskets aren't they!

MTXM wrote:Thanks Russ and it is the Anthracite car that you saw at ICCCR, ie. the matching pair to yours! Regards, Matthew T.

Ah yes, I remember very well.

I believe when I bought my car, the mot highlighted a leaky exhaust manifold, which fortunately was sorted out before I officially bought it.
I know it is a different engine, but cannot be an easy thing to do on any engine.

Excellent job.

Well done Matthew.
Those nuts look like Torx fittings.

The nuts are a kind of inverted torx shape or star head nut..

Ive done one of these and there is little room.. well done mathew

Your lucky really.. cracking manifolds are the other issue of seemingly blowing gaskets but looks like it was the gasket in your picture..

citroenxm wrote:The nuts are a kind of inverted torx shape or star head nut..

Yes, clever little things. They're bi-hex and a normal bi-hex 10mm socket fires them a treat so you don't need a special tool.

I found the bi-hex shape gave great purchase and even though some were biblically tight they al gave in without the slightest sign of any tendency to round off the corners as perhaps a normal hex nut might...

Bet that shifts better now!

beko1987 wrote:Bet that shifts better now!

And quieter too!!!

A really blown one makes the TCT sound like a tractor...